


soldiers without a war

by parsnipit



Series: with wings [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - Wings, Angst, Gaang (Avatar) as Family, Gen, Hurt Sokka (Avatar), Hurt Zuko (Avatar), Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Iroh (Avatar) is a Good Uncle, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Slash, Two For The Price Of One, Wing Grooming, Wingfic, Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck, and!!, it's more likely than you think, separation anxiety? in MY sokka?, sokka and zuko are the gaang's big brothers and they do a great job
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:13:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25679413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parsnipit/pseuds/parsnipit
Summary: [a rollingcrack!of thunder jolts sokka awake. he groans, reaching up to scrub his face with his hands before forcing himself to sit. two people stand silhouetted against one of the windows, looking out at the storm. lightning flares across the sky again, chased by a roar of rippling noise.oh, shit,sokka thinks.zuko.]or: zuko learns what it means to have a flock, and sokka learns what it means to lose one.
Relationships: Minor or Background Relationship(s), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar)
Series: with wings [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1862083
Comments: 33
Kudos: 386





	soldiers without a war

**Author's Note:**

> aaaa thank u guys so much for the feedback on the first part of this series!! i'm so so glad everyone seemed to like it so much; here’s part two! you definitely don’t have to read part one to understand this part, but if u want great artwork and more thorough wing descriptions/species references i would recommend at least glancing through part one’s end notes! :D
> 
> **warnings: injuries, symptoms of ptsd, references to child abuse + neglect, abandonment issues, self worth issues**

a rolling  _ crack!  _ of thunder jolts sokka awake. he groans, reaching up to scrub his face with his hands before forcing himself to sit. lazy he may be, but after a year on the road he knows better than to ignore the approach of a storm. he’ll be soaked through with rain and miserable in minutes—besides, the last thing he wants is to have to suck on one of aang’s weird herbal frogsicles if he gets sick again. that was  _ not  _ cool the first time, and he’s in no hurry to repeat the experience.

sokka glances around for his friends, then hesitates. they’re not outside; they’re in a sturdy metal building. even as he listens, he hears rain begin to patter against the tin roof overhead. appa is curled into a loose c-shape with his people tucked against his warm belly. sokka himself lays on one of appa’s middle legs—loose white fur tickles his nose, and he rubs at it, blinking blearily. yellow straw litters the ground below them, and all around sokka can hear a quiet stirring: the rasp of scales, the clatter of hooves, the tranquil breathing of a hundred living things.

the stables, he remembers, suddenly. they’re in the stables.

“...to be fine,” someone murmurs, and sokka glances over. two people stand silhouetted against one of the stable’s windows, looking out at the storm. lightning flares across the sky again, chased by a roar of rippling thunder.  _ oh, shit,  _ sokka thinks.  _ zuko. _

zuko—easily recognizable by the gleam of his armored wings—stands in front of the window, his arms wrapped around himself and his eyes fixed to the coming storm. even from here, sokka can see the rapid rise and fall of his chest as he pants. katara stands next to him, one hand on his arm as she speaks. sokka worms his way off of appa’s leg, flopping into the straw before grabbing his crutch and scrambling onto his feet.

zuko doesn’t even glance in his direction.

katara does. “sokka,” she says as he approaches. her voice sounds calm, but there’s an edge to it that sokka doesn’t like. “he’s not doing well.”

“should i wake the others?”

“no. i don’t want to crowd him.” katara looks back to zuko, her eyes clouded with worry. “we may need to get iroh.”

sokka looks outside again. dark clouds clot the skies, shot through by flickering bolts of jagged light, and rain pours viciously onto the dusty grass. the wind is beginning to pick up, pushing its way through trees and buildings with a violent howl. he grimaces. 

“i’ll go,” katara says. “i can at least stay dry.”

“no way,” sokka says immediately. 

at the same time, zuko flinches around to look at katara, wild-eyed. “no,” he says, and he sounds desperate. “no, you can’t go out there. you’ll get hurt.”

katara reaches up, taking his trembling hands and folding them between her own. “okay,” she whispers. “okay, i’m staying.”

“hey, buddy. you with us?” sokka asks, reaching out to rest a gentle hand on zuko’s back. the muscles there are hard and knotted with tension, his wings shivering anxiously where he clamps them to himself. the weight of their armor can’t be helping, but sokka knows better than to suggest he take it off—not when he’s already feeling so vulnerable. “it’s only a storm.”

zuko doesn’t dignify that with a response. he looks back out at the clouds, his jaw tight. sokka and katara trade a worried glance; they  _ really  _ need iroh. unfortunately, sokka doubts zuko is going to let either one of them outside while it’s storming. this whole situation would be easier, he supposes, if they had actually slept inside the palace the way they were supposed to.

because that’s the thing, isn’t it? they all  _ have  _ rooms in the palace—very nice, very cushy,  _ very  _ expensive rooms. after so long sleeping on the road or in a sky bison’s saddle, it’s an incomparable luxury. sokka doesn’t completely ignore his new room; he stores all of his things there (although  _ all of his things  _ is, admittedly, not very much) and even steals a nap on the couch, from time to time, but he’d taken one look at that empty, lonely, soft-enough-to-swallow-him bed and thought, quite promptly,  _ no thank you. _

the others had been of a similar mindset. sokka had gone to find suki that first night, but suki had gone to find toph and toph had gone to sit with zuko in the infirmary, so in the end the three of them had clustered together, sleepless, until suki had decided that sitting around and worrying wasn’t going to do them any good. she’d dragged toph and sokka away to find katara and aang, but neither of them were in their big lonely beds either. sokka had felt the familiar tingling of panic starting in his throat (his friends were gone, his friends were  _ lost in the fire nation),  _ but he managed to swallow it because he had a pretty darn good idea where the two of them could be hiding—and he was right.

they found aang and katara curled up with appa in the stables, sleeping in the straw. he, toph, and suki had snuggled up with them. it was the first peaceful night of sleep sokka had had since the war ended. the very first night zuko left the infirmary after his injury, he’d showed them his old bedroom (his old bedroom with the big lonely bed), and sokka hadn’t missed the small, miserable look that flashed through his eyes. 

“we sleep in the stables,” he informed zuko.

“you  _ what?”  _ zuko had rounded on him, eyes blazing. “they put you in the stables? with the animals? you’re my guests! and—and i’m the firelord now, right? i mean i know the coronation hasn’t taken place yet but—but it should still count, and you should still have been treated with the highest possible respect, and anyway aang’s the  _ avatar  _ so—”

“cool it, sparky,” toph said, elbowing him gently. “they gave us bedrooms.”

“really nice bedrooms,” aang added cheerfully.

zuko looked between them all, his brow crinkling with confusion. “then why…?”

“appa’s in the stables,” aang explained. “i didn’t just want to leave him alone, and he won’t fit in here.”

“besides, everything here is—it’s really nice,” katara said, resting a hand on zuko’s elbow. “your uncle made sure we had everything we needed, but...it’s just a little lonely, i guess. it’s easier to sleep if we’re all together.”

“oh. i...guess that makes sense.”

“and  _ obviously  _ you’re invited, your majesty,” sokka said, hip-checking zuko so he stopped looking so damn  _ anxious.  _ “i mean, we get it if you don’t wanna sleep in a crummy old stable, but—”

“no! no, i—” zuko cleared his throat, cheeks pink. “i’ll be there. being back in this room is weird, anyway.”

katara sighed, herding him back out into the hallway. “alright, but i’m going to change your bandages first. we need to keep your wounds clean or they’ll just get worse.”

“yes ma’am.”

so here they are, now, trapped in the stables while a storm crashes overhead and zuko has a quiet meltdown because lightning reminds him of war. sokka reaches forward, bracing a hand carefully on zuko’s chest, well above his wound. “come on, buddy,” he says. “let’s go sit down. staring at the lightning isn’t gonna make it go away.”

zuko balks, digging his heels in, as mutinously stubborn as ever. sokka recognizes the stance he’s in—it’s the same one he practiced over and over with aang on the beaches of lake laogai, footing wide to keep his balance, hands curled loosely in front of his stomach, two fingers on each hand extended and two tucked into his palm. he’s ready to catch the lightning if it comes for them.

“you don’t need to redirect it because it’s not going to come in here,” sokka explains as patiently as he knows how. he doesn’t get it—doesn’t get this sudden, irrational _fear_ zuko’s developed but he knows it’s real and he knows it hurts. “it’s a storm, it’s not out to get you. besides, the lightning will hit the stables before it hits anything _in_ the stables, and then all you’ll have to worry about is putting out the fire. you can do that, easy.”

zuko shifts his weight nervously and lets sokka guide him a step back before freezing in place again. progress. 

“and even if someone does get hurt, i’ll heal them,” katara adds firmly, “just like i healed you.”

“but it’s not going to hit anyone, because that’s not how lightning works unless it’s being magically manipulated by somebody as crazy as your sister—which it _isn’t,_ because she’s far, far away from here,” sokka insists. “remember? your uncle sent her away. he wouldn’t let anyone dangerous stay near you.”

another tiny step backwards. sokka exhales in relief. then the stable door creaks open and all three of them jump; sokka and katara mantle their wings while zuko whips around, already cradling a ball of fire in each palm. a portly old man steps into the stables, shutting the door gently behind him. he carries a tray of tea mugs. 

“oh, thank the spirits,” sokka says, his knees weakening with relief. he leans a little harder on his crutch.

“uncle?” the fire in zuko’s hands dissolves as he straightens up.

“good evening, children,” iroh says, setting the tray of mugs down near appa. the others are already stirring; suki’s eyes slit open warily while toph presses a hand against the ground to feel out the situation. aang, curled up on appa’s side, wakes with an enormous yawn. his eyes widen when he sees the lightning flickering outside, and he huddles closer to his bison. “i’m sorry to wake you, but i had a feeling i would be needed.”

“well, you felt right, old man,” sokka says. “is that for us?”

iroh hands him one of the tea mugs, and sokka curls his fingers around it and lets the warmth seep into his joints. he limps away from zuko (albeit somewhat reluctantly) to let iroh do his magic uncle thing. katara does the same, handing out tea to the rest of their group before going to sit next to aang. he looks shaken by the sight and sound of the lightning, too, and sokka can’t say that he blames him—or either of them, for that matter.

when something kills you, it leaves more than a physical mark.

sokka goes to sit next to suki, and she wraps a wing around him while she drinks her tea. sokka leans sleepily against her, sipping his own tea less enthusiastically—he doesn’t really understand the appeal of leaf-flavored water, but he doesn’t  _ hate  _ it. whatever blend iroh’s chosen tonight is sweet and mellow, warming through the cold knot of fear that sits, ever-present, in sokka’s stomach. 

“is sparky okay?” toph asks. “i mean, i’m no medical professional, but even i know his heartbeat shouldn’t be that fast.”

“iroh’s working on it,” suki says. 

“what about twinkletoes?”

“katara’s working on it.”

“cool.” toph’s fingers flex around her own mug of tea. “...we’re all kinda fucked up, aren’t we?”

sokka can’t deny it. he watches quietly as iroh steps in front of zuko, drawing his nephew’s eyes away from the storm outside with gentle words and a deft hand on his jaw. zuko flinches the way he always does when someone reaches for his face, but he doesn’t jerk away, and iroh guides him to turn away from the window. he keeps one hand carefully on zuko’s shoulder, spreading a wing out behind him to shepherd him towards appa. 

at iroh’s prompting, zuko settles down next to suki. suki extends a wing, sliding it behind him to replace iroh’s as a guard. iroh sits in front of zuko, cupping his hands in front of himself; a small orange flame flickers to life in his palms. zuko lifts his own shaking hands to copy his uncle—his flame shivers almost as much as he does, and sokka looks nervously at all the  _ very flammable  _ straw surrounding them. but hey, if the firelord and the dragon of the west combined can’t put out a fire, who can, right?

satisfied that iroh has zuko well in hand, sokka scrambles up to check on his other friend. aang sits curled into katara’s side, her wing draped protectively over his back. sokka sits on his other side, overlapping katara’s wing with one of his own. aang leans gratefully against him, nestling his head on sokka’s shoulder.

“hey,” sokka says. “how are we doing?”

“i’m okay,” aang says. his voice is clear and smooth, but the way he trembles faintly against sokka belays his words.

katara reaches out, smoothing a hand over aang’s head. “hopefully the storm passes soon and we can all get back to sleep.”

“yeah,” aang murmurs. “i hope so.”

they lapse into silence, nursing their tea slowly. aang breathes in a careful, measured tempo that stills and cools the air around them. once katara’s tea mug is empty, she slides off of appa and kneels next to iroh. she whisks the water out of iroh’s clothes, using it to rinse out everyone’s tea mugs before stacking them back onto the tray. sokka stays next to aang, offering him a shoulder to lean on while he breathes himself into some semblance of calm. 

less than an hour later, the storm has passed. the air is warm and damp, scented with rainwater and bruised flower petals from the gardens. aang snoozes against sokka’s shoulder; sokka gently eases him back onto appa’s side before sliding down. most of his friends are sleeping again, sprawled out on and around appa. he tiptoes over their bodies to sit in front of zuko. 

“hey,” he says. “feeling any better?”

“shh,” zuko hisses. his uncle sleeps next to him in the straw, snoring raucously. if  _ that  _ noise won’t wake him up, sokka really doesn’t think anything else will.

when sokka speaks again, he does so in a  _ very pointed  _ whisper. “i said  _ how  _ are you  _ feeling?” _

“i’m fine.” zuko closes his hands around the little flame still hovering in his palms, and it disappears. “shouldn’t you be asleep? the sun isn’t even up.”

sokka flops down in the straw in front of zuko, sprawling out and stretching his wings. one brushes against suki; the other rests, half-folded, in zuko’s lap. he adjusts his injured leg carefully in the straw before relaxing with a contented sigh.

“sokka—sokka, not  _ here,  _ you have a blanket over by appa—”

“you’ll keep me warm, right, fire guy?”

zuko groans, albeit quietly so he doesn’t wake iroh. 

“shh, zuko,” sokka mumbles, shutting his eyes. “i’m  _ sleeping.” _

“you’re ridiculous, you know that? you know that. of course you know that. prick.”

a smile flickers across sokka’s face, and he snuggles down into the prickly straw beneath him and falls asleep to the low grumble of zuko’s voice and the peaceful breathing of his friends and the shifting movements of the livestock in the stalls next to them.

(when he wakes the next morning, there’s a terribly heavy wing draped over his head and shoulders. he squints, and through the dark, he can see that zuko has slumped over at some point in the night. he sleeps with his mouth open, one armored wing mashed against his back and the other draped inelegantly over sokka. and sokka? well, sokka teases him about a lot of things, but he won’t tease him now—not for this.)

* * *

“what are you going to do now that the war is over?” suki asks him, raising her voice to be heard over the breeze. the two of them glide hundreds of feet above the fire nation palace, drifting lazily on thermals as they circle each other. “have you thought about it?”

“not really,” sokka admits. he’s been a little too busy adjusting to the fact that  _ the war is over.  _ besides, right now he has a safe, stable home with his friends and family. he’s in no mood to rush away from that—although he knows himself, knows now that he has the taste for travel he’ll never quite get rid of it, knows that he’s made to migrate and so he will. 

just...not yet.

“what about you?” he asks. “are you going back to kyoshi?”

suki flaps her powerful wings, the sunlight gleaming off of her tawny feathers. sokka sighs wistfully. she’s so pretty. “i will eventually,” she says, “but a lot of the girls are coming up for zuko’s coronation. i’ll stay until then.”

sokka grins. “that’s awesome. i can’t wait to see everyone again.”

“hey, sokka?”

“yeah?”

“would you be interested in coming back to kyoshi with me?”

sokka’s eyes widen. 

“you could finish your training,” suki adds. “you were getting pretty good. i’m sure we could find an apartment for you, and you could get a job on the island. we could stay together.”

it’s tempting, sokka has to admit. his heart aches when he imagines being separated from suki again—their relationship has always been a distant thing, and to have her moments away instead of oceans away these past few weeks has been incredible. then he thinks of leaving katara, of leaving aang and toph and zuko, and his heart aches even more. he’s left pieces of himself scattered across the world and he can’t possibly be with them all.

“i…” he starts, then hesitates. 

suki’s eyes soften. “hey. it’s okay if you can’t decide right now. just think about, alright? let me know.”

“thanks, suki.”

the two of them land in the courtyard a few minutes later; several of the guards shoot them suspicious looks. sokka grabs his crutch and  _ hmphs  _ at them as he strides past, his nose in the air. he’s one of the firelord’s best friends, thank you very much, and co-conspirators with the avatar to boot. plus, if he was going to be cowed by fire nation soldiers, it would have happened quite some time ago. 

he and suki walk stride-for-limping-stride to the residential wing of the palace. all of the doors here are propped open, and sokka pokes his head into each one as he passes, calling his greetings to his friends. they find zuko and katara in zuko’s bedroom; zuko sits in front of her on the bed, his shirt off and head bowed. katara gently unwinds the bandages from his torso, laying them aside. sokka can’t help but wince when he sees the damage.

zuko’s scar—so terribly like aang’s—focuses directly above his heart. the skin there is twisted and wrinkled and colored in mottled, glassy reds. several lines dart away from the center of the scar, lacing their way across zuko’s ribs and stomach and shoulders in a complex fractal of burnt skin. 

“woah,” sokka says. zuko looks up, startled. “dude. that’s badass.”

zuko snorts, and katara rolls her eyes as she reaches for a pan of water. she gloves her hands in the water, then settles them over zuko’s chest. the faint blue glow of her palms casts odd shadows across the bed; zuko closes his eyes. 

“how is he?” suki asks. 

“better,” katara says. “definitely better. his internal injuries are completely healed; i’m just trying to fix some of the superficial muscles now. the less they scar, the better off he’ll be.”

sokka takes a seat next to zuko, bouncing on the ridiculously soft mattress. “me next, me next!”

“sit still,” katara scolds, moving her hands out along the patchwork lines of zuko’s scar, “and hush. i’m trying to concentrate.”

“my leg huuuurts.”

“that would be because it’s broken. you don’t need me to tell you that.”

“why can’t you make it un-broken faster?”

“i’m a healer, sokka, not a magic fix-it button.” katara flicks water at his face, and he yelps in offense. a smirk crosses zuko’s face, and he cracks an eye open to look at the both of them in wry amusement. “now stop being so dramatic and let me work. the faster i finish with zuko, the faster i’ll get to you.”

sokka flops back on zuko’s bed, staring up at the canopy. suki climbs up next to them, helping sokka to disassemble his splint. his leg really  _ is  _ much better than it was; it still aches dully most of the time, but the pain isn’t nearly as sharp as it was the first few days after he’d broken it. katara—despite her insistence to the contrary—works magic when it comes to healing.

once katara finishes healing what she can for zuko, she wraps his torso in thick white bandages again. “thank you, katara,” he says quietly, offering her a smile. it’s a little crooked and a lot awkward, but katara’s eyes soften when she sees it anyway. 

“you’re welcome,” she says. then she turns to sokka and cracks her knuckles. sokka gulps. “your turn.”

sokka winces as she reaches out, readjusting his leg before firmly settling her hands against it. she’s quiet for a moment, a crease between her brows, before she pulls the last of the water from the pan and presses it to sokka’s skin. for a few seconds, it’s warm and smooth and comforting—then the water begins to glow, and the dull ache in sokka’s leg morphs into an unbearable itch. he wrinkles his nose and whines and fights not to squirm because that is  _ extremely unpleasant  _ and he has every right to complain about it, okay, so the amused look that zuko and suki trade over his head is completely uncalled for! 

spirits, he doesn’t know how zuko endures this every day. katara has to be nicer to him—it’s the only explanation. 

“there, tough guy,” katara says several minutes later, whisking the water away from him and back into the pan. “you can stop looking so miserable now.”

“oh thank the spirits. how much longer until it’s better?”

“it wasn’t a clean break, and it tore up a lot of the surrounding muscle. the swelling and bruising has already gone down, and it feels like your muscles are back to normal. a lot of the vessels have finished repairing themselves, so your blood is flowing the way it should again. but the actual bone…” a worried frown flickers across katara’s face. “i don’t want to rush it. i’ve never healed bone before, and a break like this is complex.”

“hey, it’s okay. no rush.” sokka smiles at her, reaching for his splint. “i guess i’ll just have to keep living off of the firelord’s charity until i’m all better.”

“oh, joy,” zuko says, stone-faced. 

“speaking of the firelord’s charity: they have some super great food in the palace kitchens and i don’t know about you guys, but i’m  _ starving.”  _ sokka hops up, hobbling over to his crutch. “if we eat enough, i bet they’d let zuko mark it down as war reparations.”

“at this rate i’m going to need to. my nation’s being bankrupted by your appetite.”

“hey, like you don’t eat just as much!”

“firebending takes a lot of energy!”

“so does being a teenager! now let’s  _ go,  _ chop chop, we have a whole kitchen to pillage.”

when sokka was a kid, he’d always imagined going off to war and defeating the fire nation and reaping the spoils of the southern water tribe’s victory. this was not the victory he imagined, and these are not the spoils he was thinking of. (they’re  _ so much better.) _

* * *

when sokka wakes up in the stables, tucked underneath one of appa’s legs, everyone is gone. he squirms his way out from under appa, leaning against the bison as he brushes straw from his sleeping clothes. his brow furrows as he looks around. a rough rhino looks back at him, chewing a mouthful of sweet hay. the livestock are all still calm and quiet—no signs of a struggle—so where are all of his friends…?

he usually sleeps late, but he’s never  _ alone  _ when he wakes up. usually katara’s nearby cooking breakfast, or toph and aang are playing some weird pebble-game he doesn’t understand, or zuko is finishing his morning meditation. today the stables are empty; even the stablehands seem to have come and gone already.

“well, i guess it’s just you and me, buddy,” sokka says to appa, rubbing one elbow. he has to admit, the sudden loneliness is disconcerting. the feeling sits uncomfortably in his chest. appa lows softly at him, licking the side of his face and leaving a line of drool. “ugh, seriously?”

once sokka has changed clothes and washed his face, he heads for the palace. the others are probably just in their rooms, right? the rooms are a more comfortable hang-out spot than the stables, anyway, especially once it warms up in the afternoon. but as he walks through the residential wing, he finds all of the doors closed. when he knocks on each one, there’s no response. the kitchens bustle with staff, but his friends are nowhere to be found there, either.

okay, so  _ now  _ is the time to worry.

more than a little jittery, sokka retreats to appa’s side, shooting the palace guards wary glances. were his friends kidnapped? is this ozai’s last-ditch attempt to win the war? sokka has no idea how the bastard would get out of prison to do anything, but if he’s half as clever as his children he’d figure something out. or what if—what if sokka’s supposed to be somewhere? did he forget something important?

holy shit, is today zuko’s coronation?

no—no, no, it can’t be. the kyoshi warriors haven’t even arrived yet, and the fire sages are still making preparations. it’s still a couple of weeks away. so where  _ is  _ everyone? sokka huddles down beside appa, drawing his knees to his chest and watching the stable doors suspiciously. then he sees the note; it’s plastered to the inside of the stable doors. in his haste to find his friends, sokka must have missed it earlier.

nervously, sokka plucks the note from the door. it’s thick paper, heavy and official. he swallows hard as he opens it. katara’s fine, swooping script greets him.  _ sokka,  _ it reads.  _ please don’t freak out. _

she knows him well. 

the note continues,  _ everyone is okay. we’re all a little busy this morning, so try to have some fun around the palace and meet us in the ballroom for lunch at noon. _

okay. weird. what could they all be busy with? like they’re all busy with the same thing, or they’re all busy doing different things and knew he’d freak out if he woke up alone so they left him a note? surely they can’t  _ all  _ be busy with non-sokka-inclusive business? they usually invite him to peace talks and coronation planning and  _ what the hell do we do with all of these fire nation soldiers now  _ meetings. but maybe—

well. actually, they’re probably off doing  _ bender  _ stuff he wouldn’t understand. (even suki, though? that doesn’t make sense. none of this makes sense!) with a twinge of bitterness, sokka makes his way back to the palace. he heads towards the guest houses, where the other kingdoms’ dignitaries are staying until the coronation and official treaty signing. the southern water tribe’s lodge is near the back, and is also suspiciously quiet.

seriously, where  _ is  _ everyone? 

to his relief, he finds bato rummaging through a chest in one of the bedrooms. “hey, bato,” he says, brightening some. if bato wasn’t invited to whatever business everyone seems to be on either, it can’t be  _ that  _ important. 

bato jumps and whirls around, his eyes wide. he relaxes when he sees sokka, his wings slumping with relief. “oh, sokka. you scared me.”

sokka smiles sheepishly. “sorry. what are you doing?”

“oh, just looking for some things. what about you?”

“i was kind of hoping dad was here so we could spar,” sokka admits, “but i guess everyone’s busy today.”

bato arches an eyebrow at him. “spar? with that leg?”

“i can still spar,” sokka says defensively. bato snorts. “i  _ can!” _

“you’re as stubborn as your father, boy.” bato shuts the chest behind him after tucking something small and shiny into his pocket. “even if you could spar, i’m afraid hakoda won’t be back for a while. you’re better off finding something else to do.”

“what’s he doing? was there a meeting or something today?”

“no, not that i know of.”

“hmph. well, what about you? do you wanna spar?”

“not with somebody on one leg.”

sokka groans, and bato grins at him. 

“okay, okay,” sokka says. “we could do something else. fishing? pai sho? wanna go look at some fire nation ships? come on, i’m  _ bored.” _

“sorry, kid,” bato says, striding by him and tugging playfully at his wolftail. “i’ve got some other stuff i need to do. maybe later, okay?”

sokka watches sulkily as bato leaves the water tribe lodge. he storms down to the turtleduck pond next, half-hoping to find zuko there on break from whatever  _ business  _ he has—but no such luck. he settles down beside the glassy water with a handful of sweetcorn pilfered from the kitchen staff (who were all, like, in a  _ super weird  _ rush to get rid of him; that or sokka’s just being paranoid now). he tosses a handful of corn to the ducks and watches as they eat. spirits, the babies are  _ so fluffy.  _ sokka wants to grab one.

“good morning, sokka. i see you found our pond.”

sokka jumps, his feathers slicking down in alarm as he whirls around. iroh stands behind him, arms folded across his chest and a small smile on his face. “oh, uh, yeah. i hope that’s okay. zuko showed us all here once, so i figured—but i can leave if—”

“no, please, stay.” iroh makes his way to sokka’s side, sitting down beside him and looking out over the pond. “it’s very peaceful here. a wonderful place for reflection.”

sokka pulls his knees to his chest, resting his chin on them. “yeah.”

“what are you reflecting on?”

“how much these ducks like corn,” sokka says, flinging another handful into the water. iroh chuckles. “what about you? what’re you reflecting about?”

“what kind of teas one might serve at a party.”

“oh.” preparations for the coronation, right. there must have been a meeting today. sokka isn’t jealous that he wasn’t invited. he’s  _ not.  _ “that’s cool.”

“what kinds of tea do they serve in the south pole?”

“oh, man, i’m the wrong person to ask about that. i don’t drink tea very much. katara might know, or my dad.”

“i’ll have to ask them.” iroh stretches his wings lazily, then lets them fold loosely against his back. “what do you like to drink?”

“water, i guess, or, uh—” sokka laughs, rubbing the back of his head. “have you ever had cactus juice? man, it makes stuff  _ weird,  _ but it tastes great. kinda fruity, but not super sweet or anything.”

“cactus juice? now that sounds like a story.”

“oh, dude, it is.” so sokka tells iroh the story, and iroh sits and listens and laughs. by the time he’s finished, the sun is climbing over their heads. “aw, man. i have to go feed appa before i go to lunch, but i guess i’ll see you around?”

“most certainly.” iroh stands, flicking a wing out to balance himself as he does. “take care, sokka.”

sokka waves to him as he heads back to the stables. “you too, uncle iroh!”

appa greets him enthusiastically as he enters, pushing his nose into sokka’s chest to nuzzle him. sokka yelps and latches onto him so he doesn’t get knocked over, dropping his crutch with a clatter. as soon as appa lets him, sokka limps to the hayloft and pushes a bale down. appa growls in thanks, quickly crushing his way through the hay with his enormous, flat teeth. by the time he’s finished, it’s noon—or near enough to it, sokka thinks.

“alright, appa. i guess i’m off to lunch now. i’d better hurry before they get  _ busy  _ again.” frowning, sokka pats appa’s nose and heads for the palace. the ballroom is hard to find; zuko had given them a full tour only once, and that was a couple of weeks ago. by the time sokka locates it, he’s fairly certain he’s late. 

the doors to the ballroom are massive, ornate things that a man with only one functional leg has absolutely no business opening—but let it never be said that sokka  _ gives up.  _ he’s wheezing by the time he wedges himself inside, and the ballroom is dark. wait, what? dark? that can’t be right. the note said lunch in the ballroom, right? it does smell like food in here, but the place looks  _ and  _ sounds empty. come on, he can’t be  _ that  _ late! 

a ball of grief, thick and sudden, lodges itself into his throat. his eyes sting. holy shit, what’s  _ wrong  _ with him, that he can’t even go a few hours away from his friends without having a mental breakdown? spirits, this is so stupid. he knows he can be dramatic but this is seriously overboard. he just needs to—to go back to the stables and snuggle with appa for a little while, that’s all. his friends aren’t  _ gone.  _ they’re just—they’re just busy. without him. away from him. 

he can’t have them forever.

then the torches along the walls and in the chandeliers suddenly burst into flame, flooding the ballroom with light, and sokka’s friends—along with what looks like nearly a hundred other people—spring out from behind the dining tables arrayed across the floor. “happy birthday!” they shout, and sokka—

sokka is feeling lots of things and he’s very confused about them all. a smile tries to wobble across his face; his wings press nervously against his back; his eyes won’t stop watering. his birthday. it’s his birthday. how the hell had he forgotten that…? (it hadn’t been important, not compared to everything else that had happened this year.)

katara hugs him first, her arms looping around his neck and hauling him down. he wraps his arms and wings around her, hugging her back just a little too tight. as she leans back, she reaches up to touch his cheek, her eyes warm. “it’s okay,” she whispers. “sokka, it’s okay.”

aang slams into him a second later, and only his airbending keeps them both on their feet. “happy birthday sokka!” he shouts, and sokka laughs. the noise is only a little watery. “you’re so old!”

“he’s not that old,” zuko grumbles. “he’s the same age as me.”

“you’re both  _ so old.” _

“woah, wait, i’m the same age as zuko now?” sokka asks, trying surreptitiously to wipe his eyes against his wrist. “dude, you’re sixteen?”

“not for long,” zuko says breezily. 

“what does that mean?” sokka demands. zuko snorts, kicking him affectionately(?) in his unbroken leg. “zuko? zuko what does that mean?  _ zuko when’s your birthday?” _

zuko ignores him, a cocky damn smirk on his cocky damn face, while toph hugs him tightly enough to make him wheeze. “happy birthday, old man,” she says, her little wings doing the best to tuck themselves around him. he folds his own wings closer to himself to make it easier. “i’m glad you made it.”

he leans his cheek against her dark hair, smiling. then she pulls back and slugs his arm which, yeah, he should have expected. 

suki embraces him next, kissing his cheek and resting a hand against his chest. “i can’t believe you didn’t remember your own birthday,” she says, her voice filled with fond amusement. “sixteen is a big deal.”

“you know, it doesn’t feel any different than fifteen,” sokka admits. “and to be fair, we’ve kind of had a  _ lot  _ going on.”

“that doesn’t make your birthday any less important.” a large, rough hand comes to rest on sokka’s head. he glances up to see dad smiling down at him as he adds, “every year is a gift.”

“speaking of gifts!” aang says, grabbing sokka’s hand and tugging him forward. “wait ‘till you see all the cool stuff we got you!”

sokka’s birthday party is...well. it’s incredible. the food is to die for and includes a freshly-brewed tea that tastes  _ almost  _ like cactus juice (“war reparations, you know how is it,” zuko had said to brush sokka’s thanks off, but there’d been a pleased glint in his eyes when sokka finished two whole plates). the gifts are equally wonderful: a tiny rock figurine of appa from toph, a set of blue-studded earrings from bato (who promises to help him put holes through his ears later that day), new boots from katara, a heavy water tribe coat from dad, a fruit pie from aang, a cute pai sho tile from iroh (it has a little white flower on it!), an ornamental dagger from suki, and a map from zuko.

a  _ very detailed  _ map from zuko.

“woah,” sokka says. “is this…?”

“the fire nation,” zuko says, clasping his hands behind his back at parade rest. “as recent and thorough a map as we have. we have no reason to shield our territory from outside eyes any longer; you’re free to share this with whoever you wish. naturally, if you ever want to travel, you’re welcome to. i’ll let you borrow a komodo rhino.” a smile flashes across his face, there and gone. “and you won’t even have to be undercover this time. i’ll permit it.”

sokka hugs him. zuko freezes up for a split second, then gingerly rests a wing against sokka’s back.

it’s a pretty awesome birthday party, looming sense of separation aside.

* * *

“come on,” aang says, leaping into the air with his wings spread. he beams down at zuko, his eyes shining. “it’ll be fun!”

“this is stupid,” zuko says, quite decisively.

sokka huffs. “no it isn’t. you just don’t like it because you’re bad at it, mr. grumpypants.”

“i don’t like it because it’s stupid. why would you want to fly for fun? what do you even do? just float around in circles?”

“come with us and we’ll show you,” aang says. “just for a little while? pleeease? we’ve never gotten to flock with you!”

“that would be because firebenders don’t flock.”

“well, if you’re too scared,” sokka says, glancing slyly away from him. “we wouldn’t want to push him, aang. you know firebenders just aren’t great at flying, and we don’t want to embarrass the new firelord in front of all his guards.”

zuko bristles. “firebenders don’t need to fly because we don’t waste our time retreating!”

“uh-huh, uh-huh. well, you have fun watching, then.” sokka gets a running start, then launches himself into the sky after aang. “see you on the ground, your majesty!”

spirits, he can almost  _ feel  _ zuko fuming. that’s so much fun. a few seconds later he hears the clang of zuko’s armor hitting the floor, and then the flap of those strange, membranous wings against the air. aang whoops in delight as zuko joins them, and he leads the way up to the others. katara, toph, and suki are already wheeling high above the palace. appa hovers nearby, yawning sleepily.

“lookin’ good, toph!” sokka shouts to her. she’s come a long way since her first flight—her wings have filled out with muscle, and her primaries are full and healthy. 

“i’ll take your word for it,” she shouts back. she sticks close to katara as she flies, using katara’s voice to position herself. 

sokka beams when he sees suki, and the very first thing she does is dive-bomb him. he yelps and barely twists out of the way in time. the two of them dart after each other, ducking and weaving through the clouds in an elaborate game of chase. aang joins them a few seconds later, but he’s a cheating cheater who uses his airbending for unfair advantages, and before long he’s latched onto sokka and dragging him towards the ground.

but this is a familiar game, by now. several hundred feet above the palace, aang releases him, and the two of them tear away from each other to get the air back under the wings. they race back up to the others (aang wins, because, and sokka repeats, he’s a  _ cheating cheater).  _ once sokka levels with his friends, he catches sight of zuko. their firebender hovers awkwardly at the edges of their group, looking all  _ kinds  _ of uncertain. there’s a pained grimace on his face as he watches their acrobatics, and sokka takes pity on him.

“come on,” sokka says, banking over to him. “how do firebenders fly?”

“we don’t. this sucks.”

“give it a chance, have some fun! you don’t just have to stay in one place. do you know how to dive?”

“seems pretty basic. it’s just pointy falling.”

sokka laughs. “yeah, that’s right! come on, let’s race—but i’ve gotta warn you, i’m the fastest diver this side of the south pole. well. except maybe katara.”

“except  _ definitely  _ katara!” katara shouts over. “want me to prove it again?”

_ “no.  _ i’m racing zuko, not you.”

“he’s a sore loser, zuko,” katara warns him.

“oh, trust me.” zuko smirks. “i know.”

“good thing i won’t be losing this time. ready? dive on three! onetwothreego—” sokka folds his wings and dives; he barely has time to register zuko’s startled shout behind him before the wind becomes the only thing he can hear. he laughs as he falls towards the fire nation palace, joy bubbling in his chest. it’s nothing like diving in the poles; the wind here is warm and heavy, and there is no salt-laden sea to welcome him below.

he pulls sharply out of his dive before he gets too close to the palace courtyard—he’d consider that a victory, yesirree. he glances back up to find zuko, then immediately shrieks and darts out of the way as zuko nearly plows into him. 

“jerk!” he shouts, and zuko laughs at him. oh, yeah, really mature for a firelord! seconds later, zuko snaps his wings out to slow his own dive, and sokka immediately winces. that’s gonna hurt. he...probably should’ve made sure zuko  _ actually  _ knew how to dive before challenging him to a race. the wind yanks zuko’s wings backwards, and zuko struggles to flap them. he’s not slowing down as fast as should be. he’s really, really not. “oh, shit.”

sokka dives after him, eyes wide. he wasn’t kidding about being a damn fast diver, and he quickly overtakes zuko and darts beneath him. zuko slams into his back (ow ow  _ ow)  _ and their wings collide with enough force to jar sokka’s teeth together. zuko flaps frantically, which is super duper inconvenient for the person underneath him, but hey, sokka’s nothing if not magnanimous, and he supposes he can’t really blame zuko for freaking the fuck out as they plummet towards the ground at what is, frankly, a very alarming speed. 

sokka shoves his own wings out, despite the battering they get from zuko’s as a result, and forces himself to flap. one of the wicked hooked claws at the top of zuko’s wings catches and snags against sokka’s own wing, and he grits his teeth against the bolt of pain. “hold on!” he shouts, and zuko’s fingers curl desperately into the back of his shirt. he can’t bring them both to a stop midair—there’s no  _ way  _ he’s strong enough for that—but he can slow them down enough to give zuko a fighting chance against gravity. 

they’re far, far too close to the ground by the time they’ve slowed enough for zuko to lurch away from sokka and catch himself with his own wings again. the both of them hit the ground feet-first, too fast and too hard; sokka barely bites back a cry of pain as his bad leg strikes the dirt. he rolls forward, head over heels, and skids to a stop on his back. holy shit.

holy shit,  _ never again. _

“oh, spirits,” he groans. “zuko i think i’m dead.”

zuko doesn’t respond. sokka scrambles up, his eyes wide. several feet away from him, zuko is on his knees and breathing hard. his wings shiver violently. one of them slumps into the dirt, but the other is half-folded to himself and unnaturally stiff. shit. shit, did he break something? sokka limps to his side (his bad leg is  _ not  _ happy with him right now) and touches his shoulder.

“zuko, hey, are you okay?” he asks.

zuko’s breath hisses between his teeth. his shoulder feels like a rock beneath sokka’s hand. “it hurts,” he manages, his voice tense. “a lot.”

“what does? your wing?”

zuko nods jerkily. sokka looks his wings over frantically. he’s no expert, but they’re practically see-through, and right now sokka’s not seeing any obviously broken bones. he reaches out to grab the edge of zuko’s half-folded wing and pull it out so he can examine the bones there, too, but zuko cries out as soon as he touches it. sokka yanks his hand back like he’s been burned.

“okay,” he says. “okay, bad wing, got it.”

the palace guards are already streaming towards them, and a frantic look enters zuko’s eyes when he sees them. sokka moves to place himself in front of zuko, spreading his own wings protectively.

“bring your physicians,” sokka orders the guards, “and give him space.”

katara—thank the spirits—lands behind them barely half a minute later, running towards them. “sokka, zuko! are you okay?”

“i’m fine,” sokka says. katara’s eyes linger on his wing. when sokka glances over, he sees blood streaming between his feathers. “it’s just a cut. look at zuko first. i think he may have broken something.”

katara hesitates, then nods and kneels next to zuko. she holds her hands over his wings, breathing deeply. sokka, after casting one last wary look at the guards, goes to join her. “nothing’s broken,” katara says, after a moment, and sokka sighs in relief. “but he definitely tore a bunch of muscles, and he’s cramping up pretty badly.”

“okay. okay, but you can fix that?”

“i can try.” katara pulls her bending water from her flask, pressing it to the base of zuko’s wings and the knotted muscles between his shoulders. “i’m going to need your help stretching them out. grab the edge of that wing.”

zuko flinches when sokka touches his bad wing again, but it says something about his growing trust in them that he doesn’t immediately spit fire in their direction and flee. as katara works, the violent trembling in zuko’s wing gradually begins to ease. he finally relaxes the full weight of his wing into sokka’s hand, and it’s—it’s so much lighter without the armor. it feels flimsy. how can he even  _ fly  _ on these things? 

“okay,” katara says. “stretch it out now. gently.”

sokka carefully extends zuko’s wing. it tenses up again, but only briefly. then zuko exhales in relief, his head bowing forward and his wing slackening in sokka’s grip. thank the spirits. appa lands several feet behind them, his saddle full of the rest of their friends. sokka sets zuko’s wing on the ground as katara continues to work on the cramped muscles in his back, and he goes to explain the situation quietly to aang and the others. once he’s finished that, he returns to katara’s side. 

“here.” katara takes his hand, setting it at the base of zuko’s bad wing. “work the muscle there. try to get the blood flowing again.”

zuko lets them work on him with a startling amount of patience. he trembles whenever sokka pushes too hard against a knot, but he doesn’t snap or snarl or jerk away. sokka tries to keep his touch as gentle as can while still, you know, accomplishing something. while katara works on easing the torn muscles beside zuko’s other wing, sokka kneads his way from the nape of zuko’s neck to the middle of his back. 

the palace physicians arrive several minutes later and speak hurriedly with katara. zuko interrupts them before they get too far. “i’m fine,” he says, his voice rough. “don’t worry.”

“you’re not fine,” katara snaps. “i did what i could, but you tore up about every flight muscle you had.”

“it’s my fault.”

all of their eyes swing towards sokka. 

“i’m the reason he dove in the first place,” sokka says, folding his hands on his knees and bowing his head. “i’m sorry.”

“what? no. it’s not your fault.” zuko scowls at him. “i chose to do it.”

“we pressured you into flying. you didn’t even want to.”

“i mean.” zuko hesitates. “i mean, i guess maybe don’t do that next time, but i  _ had _ a choice. you didn’t force me to do anything. you didn’t trick me. it’s not your fault. besides, you—” he stops, suddenly, his eyes widening. “you’re bleeding.”

“yes,” katara says grimly. “he is. sokka, come here.”

“i’m fine, it’s just—”

_ “now.” _

sokka shuffles forward, gingerly stretching his wing towards her. she moves his feathers out of the way, her fingers sticky with his blood, until she finds the injury. sokka winces as she touches it; it doesn’t feel long or deep, but  _ damn  _ does it sting. it stings less once she settles her magic water into it—stings less and itches more. 

“did i cut you?” zuko asks quietly. sokka nods reluctantly. “shit. shit, i’m sorry, i didn’t—”

“that wasn’t your fault. if it wasn’t my fault that you tore up your back, then it’s not your fault my wing got cut. deal?”

zuko hesitates, his eyes lingering on the dark blood in sokka’s feathers.

_ “deal?”  _ sokka insists, thrusting his hand forward. 

“deal.” zuko sighs and shakes his hand. “but seriously we’re never doing that again.”

“no, you are not,” katara agrees, whisking a handful of pink-tinted water away from sokka and flinging it across the dirt. “zuko’s not ready for that sort of thing. he barely uses his wings—they’re not strong enough to pull him out of a dive. now that they’re torn the way they are, he shouldn’t even be flying. shouldn’t be wearing armor, either. it’s an unnecessary strain.”

“i need my armor.”

“i know.” katara sighs. “that’s why i’m not asking you to give it up. just take it easy, okay? no more flying, at least for a few months.”

“not a problem with me,” zuko says. he sounds relieved. 

“you need physical therapy if you want these to heal right. the muscles in your chest and back are all atrophying. a lot of it’s from your first injury, after azula, but part of it’s just because you never use them.”

“but you told me not to train until this was healed,” zuko protests, gesturing to his chest.

“i know i did. i’m not saying  _ train,  _ i’m saying  _ physical therapy with your physicians.  _ once you’ve been through that, maybe you can get back to training.”

zuko groans.

“yeah, yeah, get over it,” katara says, standing up and nudging zuko onto his feet. “go with the physicians now. figure it out and don’t come back until you do.”

zuko slinks off with his physicians, who all cluster around him like a bunch of worried hens. katara rounds on sokka, next, and he withers beneath her glare.

“and you! what on earth were you thinking? you’re lucky you both weren’t hurt more seriously.”

“hey, you didn’t tell me  _ not  _ to dive with him!”

“i know. i wasn’t thinking.” guilt flashes through her eyes. “i’m not mad about that. i’m mad about you jumping below him!”

“well, it was that or let the firelord fall to his death. i don’t know about you, but i kind of like this one. not fond of losing him.”

she rubs her temples. “...i know. i just—you scared me. how’s your leg?”

“sore.”

“sit down. let me see what i can do.”

in the end, they’re both fine—but zuko won’t fly with them again for a long, long time.

* * *

toph leaves first. “i’m going to see my parents,” she announces a few days after zuko’s coronation. “i’m leaving with bumi’s dignitaries. they’ll take me back to gaoling.”

they all cry. spirits, of course they do. sokka hugs her as hard as he can until she bats him with her wings and forces him off.

“are you sure you’ll be okay?” katara asks, already fretting. “what if your parents are still mad at you for running away? what if they don’t let you leave again?”

toph folds her arms over her chest, determined. “they can’t keep me anywhere i don’t want to be kept anymore. i’m the greatest earthbender in the world! and so what if they’re still mad? they’ll either get over or they’ll kick me out, and if they kick me out, hell, at least i know where i stand with them. i’ll find you guys again. don’t worry.”

“we’re gonna miss you,” aang says, his voice cracking. toph sighs and lets her hug him again. she doesn’t even punch him. “promise we’ll visit! we can’t just never talk to each other again.”

“i promise. you guys know where to find me. if i move on, i’ll send a message to let you know.” she pats aang’s head gently before pushing him away. “come on. we knew this was going to happen. we can’t all stay together forever.”

sokka doesn’t see  _ why not.  _ his own eyes sting furiously, and he swipes at them. “if they try to clip your wings again,” he says, his voice wobbly, “i’ll kill them.”

“and i’ll help,” zuko says, his voice low and ominous. for the first time, sokka sees those dark, armored wings begin to mantle.

sokka thinks they’ve got this  _ big brother  _ thing down pat. 

he spends most of the night after toph leaves wallowing in his own misery. his friends are in a similar state; they longue around on appa, brooding frowns on their faces. 

aang and katara leave next. 

they stay until katara is satisfied that zuko and sokka are healed enough to completely hand over to the palace physicians. zuko’s scar looks drastically better—the skin is still warped and dark, but it’s no longer painfully red—and his strength and range of motion improves every day with his physical therapy. the same cannot be said for  _ sokka’s  _ range of motion.

“the bone is set,” katara explains, her palm pressed to his shin. “it hasn’t completely hardened yet, but you should be able to start putting weight on it. you  _ need  _ to start putting weight on it. right now the muscles around it are atrophied because you haven’t been using them; i think that’s why you’re still limping.” her mouth presses into a thin line. “i  _ hope  _ that’s why you’re still limping.”

“i’m sure it is. look, you did great! i bet it healed a lot faster than it would have without you,” sokka says. it’s still been a miserable couple of months, but hey, if there’s one motto he’s learned this past year, it’s that things could always be worse.

“i hope. i’ll talk about your physical therapy with the physicians.”

“what? you don’t wanna help me yourself?”

katara takes a deep breath, and that’s when sokka  _ knows.  _ that knowing sits like a lump of ice in his stomach.

“no,” he says, his voice cracking. “katara…”

“aang and i want to go to the southern air temple.” katara reaches out to take his hands, her eyes seeking out his. “we want to start reconstruction there. when the air nomads return, they’ll need a place to stay.”

“what if they never come back?”

“they will. we can’t give up hope. the first airbenders learned from the bison, right? so there has to be a way for other people to learn, too, especially now that aang can energybend. and even if that doesn’t work, if— _ if,  _ a very long time from now—aang has kids, some of them are bound to be airbenders.”

“but i don’t want you to go.” sokka’s eyes sting, and he swipes furiously at them. he shouldn’t be this upset. it’s stupid. he  _ knew  _ she would leave, just like toph did, but the reality of it feels like swallowing ice shards. “you’re my sister.”

“you can come with us. i’m sure aang wouldn’t mind.”

“i can’t. dad wants me to come back home, and i have to be there for the tribe, especially if i’m going to be the next chief, and—and—”

“oh, sokka.” katara leans forward and hugs him, cupping the back of his head. he buries his face into her shoulder, breathing shakily. “it’s okay. we’ll send messages, alright? and we’ll visit whenever we can. the temple’s only a day’s flight from the south pole, or a couple days’ sailing.”

“i’ll miss you. a lot.  _ a lot  _ a lot.”

“i know.” she kisses the side of his head, and he has to swallow a sob. “shh, i know. i’m going to miss you too.” her voice cracks at the edges, and sokka wraps his wings around her like that will ever be enough to make her stay.

it isn’t.

the next day, sokka helps them pack their supplies into appa’s saddle. he cries into momo’s fur, and then into appa’s, but he manages to stop his sniveling long enough to look seriously at aang. “be careful, okay? if you need anything—literally anything—you have friends all over the world.”

“i know.” aang smiles at him. “thanks, sokka. you too, okay? if you need us for anything, just send us a message and we’ll be there.”

“i won’t forget it.” sokka cups a hand behind aang’s head and knocks their foreheads together. “see you around, little brother. i love you.”

aang hugs him around the waist, squeezing tight enough to leave sokka breathless. “i love you too,” he says. “i’m gonna miss you guys so much.”

katara joins them a moment later, cupping them both in her wings. being parted from them feels like ripping a piece of his own heart out. he doesn’t sleep in the stables anymore, after that—not with appa gone, carrying two precious passengers away to rebuild a temple and a culture. 

sokka knows he can’t stay here. he can’t keep watching people leave; it hurts too spirits-damned much. the night katara leaves, he sits and he holds the coat his father gave him. (katara’s never been so far away from him before,  _ never.  _ her absence is a physical ache in his side.) he knows where dad wants him. he knows where suki wants him. he knows where zuko wants him.

he just doesn’t know where  _ he  _ wants to be. 

he does, however, know where he’ll be most useful. ultimately, that’s what he bases his decision on. that’s always been what he bases his decisions on, hasn’t it? not on what he  _ wants,  _ but on what other people  _ need.  _ he lives to be a soldier, to be used, to do what’s best for everyone else even when it feels like tearing his own heart to shreds. 

“so?” suki asks. “have you decided?”

“yeah.” sokka sets his coat aside, taking a deep breath as his stands. his bad leg trembles under him. he refuses to reach for his crutch. “i’m sorry, suki. i have to go back to the south pole. there’s so much rebuilding that needs to be done, and i know the northern tribe is helping but i need to be there for my people and i’ve already been gone so long and—”

“sokka. sokka, hey.” suki takes his hand, folding it between hers. there’s grief in her eyes—grief to match his, he’s sure—but not anger. “i understand.”

and sokka knows she  _ does  _ understand, because she’s a soldier, too, and her people will always come first. 

“i’m sorry,” he says, his voice thick. “i’m really sorry. i love you.”

suki hugs him, burying her face against his neck and surrounding him with strong wings. “i love you too,” she whispers. “still friends, okay? no matter what. if you need me, send a message and i’ll be there.”

she sails for kyoshi the next morning. sokka doesn’t leave his room for the next two days. zuko tries to help, bless his awkward firebender heart. he brings sokka lunch on the second day and shuffles nervously in place until sokka rolls over and acknowledges him. “i brought food,” he says, “since you weren’t at breakfast.”

“thanks,” sokka murmurs, then buries his head under his pillow again.

“...are you gonna eat it?”

“yeah.”

“okay, because it’s really a waste if you don’t. the chefs made it special. it’s, uh. water tribe stuff. sea prunes? it smells gross.”

“tell them thanks.”

“right. i will.” zuko hesitates, then takes a tentative seat on the edge of sokka’s bed. when he speaks again, he sounds like he’s trying to channel his uncle. he’s pretty bad at it, comparatively, but sokka appreciates the gesture. “um. so i know you’re sad and stuff, which makes sense because everyone’s leaving but—i mean, you can still stay here, as long as you want. i’m sure your messenger hawk will be back soon and you can send him off with messages to everyone. or if you don’t wanna wait, you can borrow some hawks from the mews.”

“thanks.”

“okay, seriously, your vocabulary isn’t this limited,” zuko says, a twinge of irritation in his voice. “why are you moping?”

“because everyone’s leaving.”

“so? they’ll be back. you’ll see them all again.”

“it’s not the same.”

“no, it’s not. the world changes. that’s life.”

sokka rolls over, glaring at him. “you’re telling me you’re not even a little bit sad that all of your friends just left you?”

“i’m…” zuko opens his mouth, shuts it. “hm. i am...sad.”

“spirits, it’s like pulling teeth.”

“of course i’m sad! it sucks that they’re gone, but it would suck even more for them to have stayed here and felt miserable because of it. they deserve the freedom to go where they want. it doesn’t mean they love us any less, they just have different passions and if it makes them happy to follow those passions, then—then okay.”

“how can you say that? i thought you, of all people, would understand.”

“understand  _ what?” _

“what it feels like to be abandoned!”

zuko flinches back.

“i heard the guards talking,” sokka grumbles, hugging his pillow to his chest. “your mom left you.”

zuko’s breathing stops. his weight leaves the bed. a few seconds later, the door to sokka’s room slams behind him. sokka winces. that was...that was probably definitely too far. spirits, great. just great! now he can feel like an even bigger piece of shit. 

except zuko comes back at dinnertime with another plate of food. “don’t  _ ever  _ use my mother to win an argument,” he says. “that was shitty.”

sokka rolls over to face him. “it really was. i’m sorry.”

“yeah, well. whatever, i guess.” he sets the plate down on sokka’s bedside table. “agni, you didn’t even touch the first plate. you know that’s probably half of why you feel like such garbage.”

“i’m not hungry.”

zuko groans and sits down next to him again, frowning at the floor. “listen. it  _ sucks,  _ okay? and it—and you—” he falters. then he sighs, his shoulders sagging. “forget it. it just sucks.”

for a few minutes, the two of them sit in silence, contemplating the suckiness of the situation. and how sucky it is, sokka thinks, that people are so rarely permanent. he has no doubt that part of his this stupid overreaction (and he  _ knows  _ it’s an overreaction, but that does nothing to make it stop) stems from his mother’s death and father’s subsequent deployment. he doesn’t like to use the term abandonment, although it’s the word his heart hisses most loudly on days like today, when everything hurts. dad didn’t mean to abandon them—he went to  _ war,  _ and anyway he left them with gran gran, not on the side of some street fending for themselves, so sokka really shouldn’t be upset about it.

besides, his dad was one of the few who actually made it back.

he jerks when he feels fingers touch his wing. zuko immediately flinches back, holding his hand to his chest. “sorry,” he says. “sorry. i just—i’ve seen you do it with the others and i thought—i thought it might help? your feathers are kind of a giant mess.”

sokka hasn’t preened since katara and aang left. wallowing takes too much of his energy. he gingerly extends his wing, offering it to zuko. he’s fairly certain that zuko has  _ no idea  _ how to preen feathers, but hey, he can’t make it worse. besides, it feels nice, having someone touch his wings. it soothes the jagged ache of loneliness in the pit of his chest.

zuko touches his feathers gently, cautiously, barely brushing the pads of his fingers over them. he’s not doing much rearranging; if anything, sokka feels like he’s being petted. he buries his face against his pillow, breathing deeply. a low tremble runs through his wings, and zuko immediately stops. “‘s okay,” sokka mumbles. 

zuko resumes his careful ministrations, stroking deftly from sokka’s coverts to his primaries. sporadic shivers rack sokka’s frame; he’s reminded of katara learning to preen his wings when they were both toddlers, her fingers clumsy and uncertain. oh, but they’d been much firmer than zuko’s—she hadn’t been afraid to yank. mom had scolded her more than once for it. the memory makes a laugh bubble in sokka’s chest, but it warps quickly into a sob. he clasps his hands over his mouth, sucking in another controlled breath as his eyes begin to water.

“hey,” zuko says. he sounds frightened. “hey, it’s okay. i mean. i mean it’s not, but it will be? sokka? are you—you’re gonna be alright, right?”

sokka is absolutely not going to be alright. all of his very best friends in the entire world are leaving him after a year spent side by side; he doesn’t even have appa or momo to snuggle anymore! the war is finally over and all sokka can do is dread the future. what kind of a life is he going to lead now? one stuck in the south pole, isolated from all of his friends, waiting for his father to die so he can become chief of a mangled tribe? he’s sixteen! holy  _ shit  _ he has so much life left to live and no idea how to live it now that he’s not playing at a child soldier.

spirits. what’s a soldier even worth without a war?

above him, he hears the soft rustle of dry skin and the noisy clatter of armor plates sliding against each other. then zuko’s wing lays over him, heavier than it has any right to be. it feels safe. sokka cries harder, hiding his tears against the pillow and breathing in shuddering gulps. zuko nestles carefully against his side and doesn’t say anything else—he just lets sokka cry and offers him a warm wing to shelter under. 

when sokka is reduced to miserable sniffling and sore eyes, zuko quietly says, “it sucks that they left. it hurts. i’m sad too, and—and i’m  _ pissed,  _ and i’m afraid they’ll never come back. maybe they won’t. but we can’t force them to stay if they want to go; all we can do is try our best to make sure we’re still a part of their lives and hope they’ll do the same for us.”

“what if they don’t? what if we never see them again?”

zuko’s eyes flicker away and sokka knows, without a doubt, that he’s thinking of his mother. “...you learn to live with it. you have to.”

“i don’t want to live with it,” sokka says, scrubbing his eyes. “why couldn’t things have stayed the same? we were happy. this was supposed to be our happy ending!”

zuko snorts. “we have a long ways to go before we get to an ending. we stopped the war, but there’s still work to be done, and we can’t ignore that. besides, i might be sad, but i’m also glad—i’m  _ proud— _ that my friends are out there making the world a better place.”

“except me.”

“yeah, well, when you decide to stop moping let me know. i have a job for you.”

“i can’t stay here, zuko. my tribe needs me.”

“good, because you’ll be working for them. the fire nation has to make repairs to its relationships with other nations. i need ambassadors—good ones, ones i can trust. you’re in a perfect position to be my ambassador from the southern water tribe.”

sokka hesitates, glancing up at him. zuko gently draws his wing back so sokka can sit up. this seems like a  _ sitting up  _ conversation, not a  _ lying in a pool of tears bemoaning life  _ conversation. “...what does that entail?”

“you can stay here, or you can go back to the south pole, or you can come and go as you please. ideally, you’d let me know what your tribe needs from me, and i could tell you what the fire nation needs from you. we’d work together to make it happen. trade routes, immigration, reparations—we could figure that stuff out together.” zuko folds his hands in his lap, studying them. “i know the southern raiders destroyed your tribe. i want to help make it right, but i need you to guide me.”

“...what if i want to go to other nations? the air temples, or the earth kingdom?”

“like i said, you’re free to come and go as you please, as long as we get our work done. i’d like you to visit me here at least one month out of the year, and i’m sure your father will have expectations of you in the tribe as well, but i’m sure you could find time to travel.” zuko glances at the window, a wistful look on his face. “there’s a whole world out there.” he looks back at sokka. “i’ve decided to go to the earth kingdom next month.”

“what? why?”

“my nation destroyed so much of their home with the war balloons. the least we can do is help rebuild it.”

“shouldn’t you send soldiers for that? why go yourself?”

“this is my nation now. i don’t want to just—just  _ tell  _ people what to do. i want to do it; sitting on that throne feels worthless. besides, i kind of got used to running around all over the world. i don’t think i’m ready to settle down yet.”

“oh, i bet your guards love that.”

a wry smile crosses zuko’s face. “think about my offer, sokka. let me know before you leave.”

“i’ll do it.”

“what?”

“i’ll be your ambassador. i mean, i’ll at least try. come on, everybody else has these great plans to change the world—i want to help too. i don’t just want to be the chief’s son again. we saved the world; we ought to get to reshape it.”

“are you sure? you don’t want to think it over first?” zuko asks, his brow creasing.

“what is there to think about? i’m going back to the water tribe. i may as well get some useful information for you while i’m at it. and if it doesn’t work out, i’ll get you in contact with somebody better suited for it.”

“right. alright.” zuko takes a deep breath, then folds his hands in front of his chest, leaning over them in the traditional fire nation bow. “then i look forward to working with you, ambassador sokka.”

“and i with you, flameo. and i with you.”

“spirits, you have got to stop calling me that.”

* * *

sokka leaves for the south pole a few days later on his father’s ship. zuko waves once from the shoreline; sokka watches until the island vanishes over the horizon, his heart in his throat as the last of his friends slips out of sight. dad comes to stand behind him, resting a wing against his back. 

“you don’t look happy,” dad says, concern clear in his voice.

“yeah. i guess not.”

“i thought you were excited to go home.”

“i am! i am. i just…” sokka looks up at the sky, his throat tight. “i miss them.”

“you know, when i left the tribe—when i left you and katara—it was the most painful part of this war. i missed you so much it just about made me sick. i loved you both so much; i never wanted to leave you.”

“then why’d you do it?”

“because i wanted to make the world a better place for you.” dad squeezes his shoulder. “your friends want the same thing—and i’m sure you want a better world for them, too.”

“i just don’t see why we couldn’t have made the world better together.”

“you  _ did.  _ we never could have won the war without you all. but you know you’re a diverse group of people; your passions and talents make you all valuable in different parts of the world. come on, sokka. they aren’t gone forever. you’ll see each other again. besides, distance doesn’t diminish love—i ought to know. i love you as much now as i did across the ocean.” dad kisses the top of his head, and sokka’s eyes sting. “grieve if you need to, but don’t ever think they’ve stopped loving you just because their destinies took them in different directions.”

dad leaves him alone after that, and sokka stands at the ship’s bow and lets the warm wind ruffle his feathers. the ocean carries him away from his friends, and no words could possibly ease the ache in his heart as it does—but he knows they love him just like he knows that he loves them, and he’s  _ going  _ to see them again, no matter how many oceans he has to cross to do it. 

they’re his friends. distance or destiny won’t change that—he’s not going to let it. 


End file.
